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Mr. Clinton's Bridge

This is a digitized version of an article from The Times’s print archive, before the start of online publication in 1996.
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Democrats streaming home from Chicago yesterday were basking in the glow of their most self-confident convention in a generation. President Clinton's speech the night before, while not salted with memorable lines, parried the attacks by Bob Dole in San Diego and outlined what he would try to accomplish if re-elected. The embarrassment of his chief campaign strategist's sudden departure failed to dampen delegates' spirits. Voters may see the incident as raising new issues of values and character, but Mr. Clinton's speech urged them to think about larger themes.

This has not been a great year for oratorical flourishes, at least from major candidates. The images of big tents, villages, train tracks and bridges seem more worthy of a convention on infrastructure. But the punch packed by the President's speech came from the inspired way it borrowed from Mr. Dole himself, using his own material against him. In an era of rapid-response campaigning, it was the first rapid-response acceptance address.

By now, for example, Bob Dole must regret that he ever declared that it takes a family, not a village to raise a child, as Mr. Clinton defended both the First Lady and the role of communities, teachers, clergy and others above reproach. Mr. Dole's biggest rhetorical mistake, however, was his clumsy offer to serve as ''a bridge'' to an America that he said was better in the 1920's and 1930's. It was an odd line coming from the party of Ronald Reagan, the arch-evangel of American optimism, and Mr. Clinton served notice that Mr. Dole would not be allowed to forget his blunder. ''We do not need to build a bridge to the past, we need to build a bridge to the future,'' Mr. Clinton said in elaborating his theme that he and the Democrats are the best leaders for the next century.

There was, as many have pointed out, a laundry-list quality to the acceptance speech as the President rattled off dozens of proposals that often seemed frankly pedestrian. Republicans will no doubt seize on them to portray the Democrats as a party of more government, though the speech was hardly a ringing endorsement of the kind of broad Federal action Mr. Clinton espoused four years ago. Instead he spoke about modest programs and targeted tax breaks for specific purposes, particularly education. In the process, he managed to make the Republican tax cut sound like a blast from the past.

Despite the speech's multitude of detail and promises to finance everything from savings elsewhere, it remains unclear how Mr. Clinton would pay for it all, especially since he has never been precise about how he plans to curb entitlements and balance the budget by the year 2002. The President's pledge to insure jobs for those thrown off welfare by the welfare bill he just signed was welcome, but it seemed to rely more on the old Reagan dream of volunteerism than concrete steps to make it happen. Both candidates need to explain how they would help these defenseless Americans.

It was striking that Mr. Clinton, like Mr. Dole, spent so little time on foreign policy. An unfortunate echo of Republican thinking was his pledge to expand NATO to include Central European countries. But the President got tremendous applause for his sensible promise not to embark on the expensive missile defense system advocated by Mr. Dole.

As usual, Mr. Clinton was most effective and moving in appealing for a sense of community and ''a campaign of ideas, not a campaign of insults.'' He was pursuing the high road while trying to head off the attacks on his Administration's financial and personal misdeeds that are sure to accelerate. His denunciation of hate crimes like the burning of churches was in a fine tradition. The convention ended with a balloon drop in which the Democrats for the first time matched the glitter ratings of the old Reagan conventions. Mr. Clinton seemed at his best doing what he clearly loves best, campaigning for President. The voters now have a clear choice, and the fall spectacle gets under way.

A version of this editorial appears in print on August 31, 1996, on Page 1001020 of the National edition with the headline: Mr. Clinton's Bridge. Today's Paper|Subscribe